LAHORE - The stuck-up capital of the exporters has accumulated to over Rs40 billion in terms of DLTL, Sales Tax and Customs while the value-added textile industry’s stuck-up claims are more than Rs10 billion alone in terms of DLTL.
Exporters said that the government announced the scheme regarding Duty Drawback of Local Taxes & Levies (DLTL) in 2009 for the exporters, in which 3% was share for the garment sector, besides additional 1% drawback was promised to exporters who will achieve an increase of 15% in exports, this was never announced. Though the period has been expired in June 2011 but our exporters are waiting for their reimbursement against DLTL.
“Now, we are going to prepare ourselves for the GSP Plus status from EU expected to start by early next year but we have to fulfill some conditions for the preferential status. No support is being provided to this vital sector and the exporters are facing severe problems in negotiating orders with EU buyers due to financial crunch”, they added.
Acting chairman of PRGMEA Amir Amin Kothawala and senior vice chairman (NZ) Jawwad Ch earnestly called upon the government to release stuck up refund claims accumulated into billion of rupees. In a SOS sent to Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif, Finance Minister, Ishaque Dar and Minister of Commerce, Khurram Dastagir, the acting chairman and senior vice chairman appealed to look into this serious matter and order to release exporters money which has been held up by the ministry of finance for the last several years and has now reached to Rs40 billion against refund claims of Duty Drawback of Local Taxes & Levies (DLTL, Sales Tax and with the Customs.
Jawwad Ch said that on one hand exporters are being pushed to enhance our declining exports in adverse market conditions while our rightful dues are being withheld, how can we be expected to finance our operations when we don’t have the required funds, he questioned.
The PRGMEA leadership urged upon power corridors in Islamabad to resolve this important issue on priority basis in order to save crippling exports.